You know the porch I’m talking about — the one where somebody’s already sitting when you walk up, coffee going cold, and the garden doing most of the talking. That’s Buck Harper’s porch, and for years his columns have been the closest thing this site has to pulling up a chair there.
Buck doesn’t write buyer’s guides. He writes about hoses that kink, fences that start arguments, fertilizer that smells like a sermon, and the people — Mabel, Granny Mae, Mama, Earl next door — who taught him that a garden is mostly what gets handed down. Start with the four fall columns below, then wander the classics. If you only read one, read the seed-saving one: it is the whole of Buck in a paper envelope.
Start here — the latest from Buck
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Thanksgiving on the Porch: What the Garden Gives in November
Mabel brought two mugs to the porch, and the November garden handed us collards, sweet potatoes, and one more reason to linger.
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The Last Tomato Sandwich of the Year
Mabel sliced the year’s last tomato, and the kitchen smelled like August again — a sandwich worth slowing down for.
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Saving Seeds from the Fall Garden: Next Year’s Garden in a Paper Envelope
Mabel, Granny Mae’s envelopes, and a kitchen table full of dried pods: saving fall seeds for next spring’s garden.
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Seed Catalogs and Porch Planning: Dreaming Next Year’s Garden Before Winter
Mabel, Earl, and a stack of seed catalogs: porch planning for next year’s garden before winter settles in for good.
The classics
- Good Fences Don’t Always Make Good Neighbors
- When the Breeze Carries a Melody (Or a Nuisance)
- Peonies and Memories
- Split, Share, and Bloom: The Southern Art of Perennial Generosity
- Scalped Lawns and Southern Woes
- The Sweet Stink of Success: Milorganite and the Art of Southern Gardening
- Garden Hoses: The Good, the Bad, and the Kinky
- City Folks and Chickens
- Pergolas: Practical Shade or Just Fancy Lattice?
- Birds, Beans, and a Little Southern Sunshine
- Picking Plants and Other Life Lessons
- Little Hands, Big Harvest: Teaching Kids to Garden
- Critters in the Garden
- A Little Dirt Never Hurt: The Art of Southern Soil
- A Little Luck and a Lot of Love
- The Secret Life of Garden Gnomes
“That is the thing about Southern living: the garden never really ends, it just changes hands.”
